Senior Emily Anderson is Stonehill's most experienced NE-10 Championship performer, with 22nd and 18th place finishes over the last two seasons, respectively. |
Skyhawks looking to surpass Springfield College's mark of 12 conference championships
EASTON, Mass. (November 7, 2014) – The Stonehill College women's cross country team, ranked No. 24 in the latest U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association (USTFCCCA) Division II poll, and ranked second in the East Region, will look to capture its sixth consecutive Northeast-10 Conference Championship this Sunday on the campus of Franklin Pierce University in Rindge, New Hampshire.
Stonehill was picked to finish first in a poll of the league's 15 head coaches with a total of 195 points. The Skyhawks, who have won the conference championship every fall dating back to 2009, received 13 of the 15 first place votes. Saint Michael's College (174 points) was selected to finish second with a single first place vote, followed by Merrimack College (152 points), Assumption College (151 points), and Southern New Hampshire University (125 points). Adelphi University, which was picked eighth with 108 total points, earned the final first place vote.
Stonehill has had a stranglehold on the NE-10 Championship since 2000, winning 12 titles in 14 tries. The Skyhawks won five consecutive conference crowns from 2000-04, added two more in 2006 and '07, and have now posted their second run of five titles in a row from 2009-13. The only two years Stonehill did not finish first, in 2005 and 2008, the Skyhawks posted runner-up efforts. With a win on Sunday, Stonehill would become the conference's all-time winningest program, as the Skyhawks are currently tied with Springfield College with 12 Championships. Springfield won all 12 of its titles consecutively, from 1983-1994.
Stonehill will enter tomorrow's action with plenty of NE-10 Championship experience, as seven current Skyhawks have competed in past Championships, including six that have registered All-Conference efforts.
Senior Emily Anderson (Manchester, Connecticut/Manchester) has run in each of Stonehill's last two NE-10 Championships, posting an All-NE-10 third team performance as a sophomore in 2012 at Jamesville Beach County Park in New York with a time of 19:27.1. She turned in a time of 19:17, just missing another All-Conference effort with her 22nd place finish last season on the campus of Saint Anselm College in Manchester, New Hampshire. This fall, Anderson has turned in a pair of top-10 finishes, including an 8th place effort in 27:26.2 three weekends ago at the Gates Farm NE-10 Preview Meet.
2013 NE-10 Rookie of the Year Nicole Borofski placed ninth and clocked in at 18:47 at last season's NE-10 Championship. |
Sophomores Nicole Borofski (Plymouth, Massachusetts/Plymouth North) and Aisha McAdams (North Kingstown, Rhode Island/North Kingstown) will be looking to replicate their performances from last year's NE-10 Championship, as they both earned top-10 finishes as freshmen in 2013. Borofski, the 2013 NE-10 Rookie of the Year, collected second team honors with her ninth-place performance in 18:47, while McAdams' seventh-place effort in 18:40 still stands as her career-best time.
Senior Brittany Venturo (Taunton, Massachusetts/Coyle & Cassidy) registered an All-NE-10 second team finish at last season's conference title race with her time of 18:55, good for 11th overall, while sophomore Alexandra Buonfiglio (Lynnfield, Massachusetts/Lynnfield) was the seventh Skyhawk to cross the finish line, doing so in 19:18 (24th overall).
The final two student-athletes on Stonehill's roster with past NE-10 Championship experience are seniors Sarah Wilson (West Suffield, Connecticut/Suffield) and Brianna Venturo (Taunton, Massachusetts/Coyle & Cassidy), both of whom earned All-Conference third team accolades in their only race. Wilson finished 21st in 18:42.74 as a freshman at the 2011 meet at Stanley Park in Westfield, Massachusetts, while Venturo finished 20th and clocked in at 19:31.6 as a sophomore in 2012.
Other Skyhawks that could make an impact on Sunday include freshman Emily Knox (Worcester, Massachusetts/Notre Dame Academy) and junior Molly Hellman (Rumson, New Jersey/Rumson-Fair Haven Regional). Knox opened her season with an 11th place finish at the Shacklette Invitational, and followed that up with a seventh-place performance the following weekend at the Division II/Division III Challenge. The freshman has earned a pair of NE-10 Rookie of the Week honors, with the last coming on October 7th.
Hellman has run in five meets this season, posting her best finish (13th in 28:38.5) at the Gates Farm NE-10 Preview Meet on October 18th.
Following this Sunday's NE-10 Championship, the Skyhawks will be off for a week before attempting to win their sixth consecutive East Region Championship on Saturday, November 22nd at Mine Falls Park in Nashua, New Hampshire.
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